As newspapers and documentary films continue to discuss waterboarding and other controversial treatments of suspected terrorists, the debate over torture remains intense. Some insist that desperate times call for desperate measures, but others are baffled that such methods could exist in a civilized society. Is physical persuasion ever an appropriate means of interrogation?
So many of you are against such things because we should uphold "we're not savages like them" bull. All of human nature us broken down to survival of the fittest and that's how our world will always be. Now think really carefully and scratch the bomb scenario everyone likes to bring up. Say your mother, daughter, wife, and whoever you care for along with others is somewhere getting ready to be sacrificed because of some crazy made up religion in the U.S. but you have no idea but the man who was committed in the act was left behind and you caught him. Do you sit him down at your kitchen table and bake him a cake asking him so very nicely to tell you the location of where they are being held? Hmm i think due to morality people would say there is always another outlet, but within lets say 3 hours what other outlet can there be?
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..by the number of citizens it has saved. Is ' waterboarding ' torture ? The bigger question is: so what? We aren't interrogating members of a radical religious jaywalkers or shoplifters - these are animals who would gladly give their lives to kill Americans and Allies. I could only thank God that these pansy, PC folks weren't in great numbers during WWII or we would STILL be debating whether or not using the Atom bombs in Japan constitute 'torture' while tens of thousands of soldiers died.
The inhumane treatment of someone has to be done by another. Meaning the torturer has to be harmed by torturing just as the one being tortured. It hurts everyone. It doesn't get the answers that one wants.
Waterboarding? I don't think it's terrible because the person doesn't die. The simulation of death is probably horrible for the person feeling it as well as the person doing it. It's disturbing, but death doesn't happen. Still wrong .
I think that there are better ways. On NPR they had a story about the CIA (I think) during WWII that had Germans that they interrogated. How did they do it? Treated them with respect and were overly nice to them and the Germans spilled everything. There is a right and wrong way to get someone to speak to you and the sugar and spice way works.
People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of thought which they avoid. - Soren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
to quote from the movie "Elizabeth" (she to Walsingham)
".a man would admit to anything (pause) under torture !"
the inquisition always got the answers they wanted but very seldom did they get any part of the truth. The Salem witch trials never got the truth even once with their torture and deaths . Many people make many claims but those who have seen this torture take place say it doesn't work.
in World War II? Waterboarding specifically--I mean, we executed the people who waterboarded US soldiers. Why wasn't that fair game? Should the government apologize for that?
A rigorous moralist would probably insist that torture doesn't have apologists, it has accomplices. After all, as Lincoln said about slavery, if torture is not wrong, nothing is wrong. In the real world, however, Obama or any other politician has to deal with the reality that at least a third of the American public is in favor of torture, not because of some farfetched Jack Bauer scenario in which it would appear reasonable, but because their morality is little more than us against them. The enemy isn't fully human and can be treated as a thing. Recall how many tons of TNT were required to disabuse the Germans and the Japanese of the same opinion or at least to prevent them from acting on their tribal prejudices.
Slight difference between WWII Germany and people who think torture can be justified.
Germany killed and tortured, enslaved and ruined millions of lives.
My personal morality is to save lives. I do believe a little bit in the us against them thing because they have proven that they follow that philosophy (9/11) and I don't want to be a sitting duck. Mostly though, save lives. Save lots of innocent lives.
they're just dishonest. They have no real qualms, but it's most self exaulting to pretend to be the super concerned pacifist. In truth they're murderous insaible people. everytime they lie.
Superficial. And all the liberals agree. They find tortured funny. Whenever it's out loud laugh. You people are murders. deceitful killers.
You haven't argued against torture , all you've done is attack the people against it. Presumably you're not, yet you call them murderers, as if that's not okay and torture is. How about you try a real argument, just once? Why is torture okay?
It saves lives.
The bottom line is that torture is never an acceptable means of extracting information from prisoners/detainees. It's antithetical to the persistence of a moral society. Our justice system is designed in such a way that a guilty man will go free before an innocent man is imprisoned. No system is perfect and innocent men have certainly been imprisoned while guilty men have walked free and yet we don't seek to abolish the pillars of due process. The justification of torture is the equivalent to the justification of convicting the innocent to ensure the conviction of the guilty. That said, the more important question is what is the standard, given the sophistication of interrogation methods, of what constitutes torture. We are on the brink of being able to determine deception on the basis of a brain scan which will potentially lead to the development of chemicals which render an individual incapable of deception. This sort of technological interrogation is a daunting challenge to a moral society and deserves due consideration.
You are exactly right that our legal and law enforcement systems are designed to give the benefit of the doubt to any accused: up to and including letting a guilty party walk free given reasonable doubt. The - true - assumption is that only those who truly intend to commit a crime do so: all of the rest of us will, by choice, perform law abiding activity.
The real decision comes when the threat of destruction becomes large enough to threaten both our society and government in a significant way. The individuals whom the police question are just that: individuals faced with the full weight and power of our society and law. Coalitions of nations extend far beyond that. When our society and government are faced with direct attack by international coalitions who *will not* negotiate unless it is solely to buy time then there *may* be circumstances where extraordinary interrogation techniques will be necessary. To pick a black and white example; a nuclear device in a major city.
Your argument is rooted in the belief that none can directly touch us: this is not true. A mild example is the Patriot Act. There is much about this law which truly is unconstitutional, but we accept it because of the threats it is attempting to nullify. Yet, we have had individual rights turned into privileges and we put up with a much increased intrusiveness by law enforcement.
Our government and society have been changed by the direct threat of coalitions nearly as strong as we are.
Is Torture ever justified? That’s the question isn’t I think that in some cases that torture is justified such as terrorists or other criminals. I also believe that if a terrorist or criminals have done something bad enough that it’s a life or death situation for other people I would most likely go for torture to save the lives of others. But I don’t believe in torturing people just to be doing it though
Yes, I believe that torture is justified at certain times..and yes I am a fan of 24..
However what I believe is that if it is likely that a suspect, say a terrorist or some other criminal has information on further attacks on innocent life and is already proven to be in league with others, then I don't think you can justify not trying to coerce the information out of the subject in question. If there is a good probability that the person can help towards saving lives and preventing further crimes then I think it CAN be justified. However I only believe it to be justified in extreme cases. If say a bank is robbed and another is to be later, but the criminals show no intent on harming others then I see no reason for physical coercion, however in cases like with terrorists in the show 24, I do see the need..usually.
Do unto others as you would want them to do untoyou
God created all men equally and therefore we shouldnt torture men. thats why we have the cia and other organizations to figure out when terrorist acts or other harmful things are going to occur.
Are we just gonna let terrorist attack our country again and say why did this happen? Or are we gonna find out before it happens and stop it from happening? If we have a terroist or someone who is a hazard to America and we have proof that they are plotting against us and are linked to terrorists we must torture them. I do agree that it is wrong but we have to do what we have to do in order to protect our home land
All humans are equal to each other. No one deserves to be crushily punnished.
It is very easy to say torture is never justified. From John McCain and Orwell's 1984, torture has never been in a high light. What many seem to don't understand is that the USA government doesn't want to torture. They only do it when they absolutely need to, and when the enemy is never responsive or co operative. I don't feel right on either side.
" Torture is the polar opposite of freedom. It is the banishment of all freedom from a human body and soul, insofar as that is possible. As human beings, we all inhabit bodies and have minds, souls, and reflexes that are designed in part to protect those bodies: to resist or flinch from pain, to protect the psyche from disintegration, and to maintain a sense of selfhood that is the basis for the concept of personal liberty. What torture does is use these involuntary, self-protective, self-defining resources of human beings against the integrity of the human being himself. It takes what is most involuntary in a person and uses it to break that person's will. It takes what is animal in us and deploys it against what makes us human. As an American commander wrote in an August 2003 e-mail about his instructions to torture prisoners at Abu Ghraib, "The gloves are coming off gentlemen regarding these detainees, Col. Boltz has made it clear that we want these individuals broken."
What does it mean to "break" an individual?
As the French essayist Michel de Montaigne once commented, and Shakespeare echoed, even the greatest philosophers have difficulty thinking clearly when they have a toothache. These wise men were describing the inescapable frailty of the human experience, mocking the claims of some seers to be above basic human feelings and bodily needs. If that frailty is exposed by a toothache, it is beyond dispute in the case of torture. The infliction of physical pain on a person with no means of defending himself is designed to render that person completely subservient to his torturers. It is designed to extirpate his autonomy as a human being, to render his control as an individual beyond his own reach. That is why the term "break" is instructive. Something broken can be put back together, but it will never regain the status of being unbroken--of having integrity. When you break a human being, you turn him into something subhuman. You enslave him. This is why the Romans reserved torture for slaves, not citizens, and why slavery and torture were inextricably linked in the antebellum South.
What you see in the relationship between torturer and tortured is the absolute darkness of totalitarianism. You see one individual granted the most complete power he can ever hold over another. Not just confinement of his mobility--the abolition of his very agency. Torture uses a person's body to remove from his own control his conscience, his thoughts, his faith, his selfhood."
Andrew Sullivan
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/11/freedom-and-tor.html
To avoid mass destruction and human damage is a primal task to carry.
What if a shot gun sniper aims at random citizens in town? Extermination order should be approved immediately. When a certain amount of casualties are supporsed, an extermination force is reconsiderble with cost of single criminal.
To force a criminal confess a crime plan which tends to mass damage by any methods as far as thinkable is rather a modest case. Yet, physical pain is not always best way to draw his plot. "A truth drug" promises remakable outcome. When a material effective enough to hold a court case is needed, we can make an interogation matrix to attempt to each of terror group. This is just a way how we can obtain a confession from criminals. Affordable.
At this point, we have to pay attention to recent circumstances that terro and war are highly suspected to be an international relationship intrigue. Every contry, including Bush family who are apparently adhesive to oil industries and self-defence market, has an intense and direct interest upon middle east oil wells. This means "DISCLOSURE OF MILITALLY INFORMATION TENDS TO BE EFFECTIVELY CONTROLED UNDER SCENARIO TODAY". Then, why are Pentagon/CIA going under controversial state? Even Pentagon vs Amnesty conflicts over the detainee problem is supposed to be a scenario. Apparently their demonstration over detainee problems had been held just after ICC's closing of Rome statute's U.S. exemption-"Any military activities under approved PKO commands are exemptional". PKO stands for a security counsil's permanent 5. We should see this action to be some kind of "DETOUR" as to avoid the truth of war operations.
Consequently, we may suspect this controversial subject to be near to same situation. Yielding to easy humanism might tend to give them an excuse to detour. "MOST UNWILLING ONES TO TAKE TRUTH DRUG AND HOLD A FACT MIGHT BE A PENTAGON"
When your reasoning lacks a firm foundation in fact and consistent logic, when your reasoning is haphazard or the result of simply "what feels reasonable", then you can justify anything, any whim that comes to mind. Without a very sound foundation in thinking, your actions are little more than those of a madman - he does what he does because he does it and doesn't genuinely understand why nor can he discover its reason and lacks the will to question his behavior.
If you torture because it feels like the right thing to do, if you find it all too easy to justify torture of another form of life, then you are truly a sadist and those of sound mind ought to be incredibly fearful of you and those who think as you do. Healthy human beings, I believe, are quickly repulsed by their own pain and, because they as human beings know suffering, are consistently repulsed by the thought of the suffering of others - whether wholly innocent or guilty of injustices - and deeply disturbed by the thought of inflicting suffering deliberately.
If any human being, any community, any culture, any religion or philosophy believes there to be justification for torture of other lives to ensure their own survival, they ought not survive.
If one wishes to guarantee one's own survival against savagery by resorting to savagery, one has sacrificed one's justification for endurance beyond the savagery one opposes. We do not rid our future of the monsters of today by behaving as monsters ourselves. By doing so, we ensure there will be ample savages in the future. The addage "fight fire with fire" is wrong when it comes to the behavior of human beings who genuinely value life, compassion, happiness and justice. It is a philosophy appropriate only to that which existed before our pretensions to civilization.
We mustn't harm savages let we too become savage. We must instead eliminate savagery. It is a very important difference .. and the right path. Savagery is a disease of the species. It isn't harmed by killing the patient or forcing them to suffer for the illness with which we all suffer. Our goal must be a healthy human being and healthy human culture of which torture plays no part.
Interesting. How much less savage do we need to be to justify "our endurance beyond the savagery one opposes?" It appears to me that it is not necessary to leap all the way to an ideal, since I see that we have made considerable incremental progress. It is clearly a moving target that must be defined by the very people in the 'improving' society. I am not sure this helps with the actual practical issues of governance, does it? I see from your other posts that you agree that morality is contextual, so how do we go about defining the savagery that we need to avoid, and again, how much less savage do we need to be? If we are prone to seeing our own flaws in others, is it progress enough to try and repudiate the flaws that most offend us?
Funny how most of the liberals here either feel torture is either wrong or the information attained by which is unreliable. Do they not watch Law and Order, CSI: Miami, Law and Order:SVU. of course they do and they love them. Almost every episode has the interrogation room scene, where the suspect is threatened, left without some need, or thrown up against the wall. Yet they feel this method obtains nothing. Of course it gets results. On top of that I'm tired of the liberals 2000 election mental disorder, interrogation has nothing to do with the war, it has everything to do with a resentment with George W. Bush. Ever scene the movie Rules of Engagement, where the character kills the Vietnam soldier to have the Vietnam commander call off the dogs for his buddy. I'm sure I'll deal with my share of wise cracks on bringing up movie and TV show characters, but these realities are day to day decisions for real soldiers. If info saves 1 man its worth it, Germans did it, Russians did it, and so do Americans. I really think the words of FBI agents don't fit, they are a domestic organization, we are talking war decisions. Liberals are always trying to impose domestic solutions to war situations WHY? Now they want to give terrorists US Citizen rights. You think your saving American Image in the world, truth is you've now given these terrorists a death sentence, the best way around Obama's fair treatment policy for guys who kill American soldiers, is blow there damn head off in the field after you got as much information as you can from them. Congrads libs you've now helped us to install an easy death penalty policy. And you wonder why we call you unAmerican and unPatriotic.
If we take our beliefs and principles seriously, we won't allow torture in any of it's "cutely" named forms in any situation.
Some of the fear mongers sound like children. Give me a break, we get hit once by a terrorist operation and look how so many are ready to trade in their civil rights and national principles.
In pop culture it's always the criminals and terrorists who torture and they always look like animals. let's keep our higher ground and say no to torture.
We have been hit more than once, but you are still correct.
By commiting acts of torture on others, we just lower ourselves , and our value system to that of the criminal. Everyone supposedly wants peace, and talks peace, but does nothing to get it, just keep on fighting and killing and nothing will change. This is going back to the dark ages when people had to face "trial by ordeal" as they did in England, where people were burned for being a witch etc. Lets all move on, progess and create a better way of living.
How then, would you propose to deal with 'uncivilized' persons who are resistant to basic questioning, in a 'civilized' manner?
In a related thought, who's to say we're any better than the terrorists (or criminals) whether we torture or not?
You sound really gung ho. Probably a macho type that thinks violence is just great. All your philosophy proves is the "might is right" approach.
Any way of dealing with trouble that doesnt involve violence is a plus.
What "basic questioning" is God only only knows. If someone doesnt want to answer that is their right.Using force or tazers or guns only enforces and creates further resentment and hatred that will ultimately lead to disaster. it's a vicious circle.
.. that's why I'm uncommitted, and my sarcasm detector is about to explode; never mind the fact that the quote is possibly as old as the ancient Romans.
Then of course there's Teddy's version: "speak softly, and carry a big stick."
Dear Gung,
Glad to hear that your sarcasm detector is about to explode.
Forget the Romans Alex The Great & co, thats all dead and gone. Look to the future and lets make a better world. Forget all your cliches , they arent worth a damn. True progress comes though making real changes , not continuing on in the same groove. Anyway , all the best and try to learn the meaning of true peace. Shalom
The "Dear Gung" made me laugh.
Jewish? Then you would approve of a homeless Israel? Just pack up and go, and when the next holocaust hits just lay down and die, don't fight back?
The point of the expression is not to be aggressive, but that if you want to be able to maintain your liberty and peace, then you must be prepared to defend yourself from attack. This doesn't mean you have to go lookng for a fight, but you can't expect any fallen man to be good in any sense of the word.
I do mean that shalom, by the way.
Hello again. I am not Jewish but I like using that word. Yes you have to defend yourself but defending is a little different to interogation techniques.Maybe you are not so gung ho after all. Glad you got a laugh out of it.
Regards
Brakers
The FBI has been exceptionally successful in getting information without getting close to the torture line. Their methods are strongly predicated on research psychology. It takes incredible skill and patience, but it works very well. The methods are not nice or pleasant, by any stretch of the imagination, but they do count as civilized.
But do they have experience with such 'uncivilized' individuals, and since any interrogation method that involves pain (even modest discomfort), anguish, or derformation, can be called torture, do the FBI's tactics not fall into this category?
Ron Suskind, in his book, claims that FBI agents successfully cracked the high value terrorist captures before the CIA stepped in, and that no further useful information was coerced. Suskind has been blasted as an ideologue and a traitor, but he looks like an investigative journalist to me. I don't want to get flamed by someone for bringing up the book, since it is not really necessary for my broader argument about the practicality of writing and enforcing a gray area law.
You are right, of course, that this all depends on what you call torture. Apparently, the FBI methods don't get all that close to the Geneva Conventions' definition. That doesn't mean that I want to experience it!
I think we're in agreement, at least as far as intelligence gathering goes. I'd like to see if there's a rebuttal to Mr. Suskind's claims though.
On second thought, I think I've made up my mind.
Torture? water boarding is not torture. Cutting your head off with a knife while you are bound.now that is torture. We should do everything within reason to gain information. We need to come from a position of strength not weakness. And don't close Gitmo, these are war criminals that want to kill us. Get a clue people.
we found out today that a conservtive federal judge ordered 5 men released from gitmo because there was no credible evidence against them. This isn't the first time this has happend. We've had high level military officers resign because they felt people in gitmo were being mistakenly held.
You're falling into the trap of assuming guilt when it hasn't been show by any objective measure. That's bad enough itself, but when you add torture on top of you then you are dealing in the devil's games.
It is great that you use the phrase "within reason." We do not all agree on what that is. How do you know that the people at Gitmo are ALL war criminals. If ten of them are actually innocent and picked up accidentally are we still honorable and good? How about one of them?
What clue should we get, yours?
Unlike people such as yourself, i'm willing to give the US military leaders the tools they deem needed to protect us. If they are not crimials let them be tried in the military courts. They should not be protected by the Geneva Convention as they are not meeting that standard nor do they recognize it as law. I'm not for deadly torture, but techinics that will give us information. I do not believe for a minute that our men and women are "torturing" all these good honest people. As most things the media is overblowing it.
The Geneva Convention is to protect us. Terrorists are dirt, and I don't much care what happens to them, but we as Americans should lead by example. We can proudly say that our freedoms and our success come without descending to the level of our foes, but by rising up triumphant. We do not take the easy way, we stand on principle. We do well by doing good. We challenge other nations to join us in the light. I am an American exceptionalist, and part of my love for this country is my belief that we can do things the right way and in doing so, lead the world.
We have made mistakes in the past, and we will make mistakes again, but we should always strive to live up to the ideals that made our country's founding a beacon in the world.